I did post a link to a digitized manuscript of Barrett's above.. having brought up the info from the RAMS version, its occurred to me its probably at least part of the basis of the 1801 version.

Its not hard to miss Barrett - he didn't do much. I think "The Magus" and "Lives of Alchemystical Philosphers" are his only publications. The source material for the Magus, like the Key of Solomon and Agrippa's books of occult philosophy was never that rare.. and probably superior to his summary. I don't think he was ever that popular or got much traction.

And since then, for the material he covered, he kind of got buried by the Golden Dawn and Theosophists, and the whole Spiritualism thing.

There's various claims made about Barrett online, like his work translation "kabbalistic texts" and whatnot, but I see no proof of that anywhere.

Coleridge and Southey played around with Agrippa in the 1790's at the height of their collaboration. Coleridge wrote "Rash Conjuror" based on Agrippa but never published the poem, which was a modification of Southey's original. I find Barrett interesting because he is a direct contemporary of Coleridge, whose own theories on alchemy changed dramatically after the turn of the century.

So I did a quick check. MS Mellon 140 is the source of the RAMS publication (you can click on the images for larger view):

There are a lot of differences between the earlier manuscript Seraphim found and the later Barrett copy. But, there are also a lot of similarities. I wouldn't be surprised if it was the source material for Barrett's translation.

So I did a quick check. MS Mellon 140 is the source of the RAMS publication (you can click on the images for larger view)

There are a lot of differences between the earlier manuscript Seraphim found and the later Barrett copy. But, there are also a lot of similarities. I wouldn't be surprised if it was the source material for Barrett's translation.

I have noticed some differences too but haven't had time to read them fully yet.

Originally Posted by Coleridgean

Schamajim means "the heavens" and seems to be related to the Hebrew words Semida and Semiramoth per the Dictionnaire historique, critique, chronologique, geographique et literral de la Bible, Volume 4

it's a variant spelling of ShMIM, shamayim which means "heaven, sky, air..." it's a combination of the words fire and water, esh and mayim. This is the Hebrew from the first verse of Genesis where ALHIM created the heavens and the earth.

Thank you all. I found some inconsistencies between the 1801 Francis Barrett version and the newer reprint from 2006. Guess I will stick to the original 1801 English translation. In the beginning God created the Heavens Shamajim (Fiery Water or Watery Fire) being the beginning of the beginning? Then Haaretz? (Earth) was created from the expansion of the Heavens?